Monthly Archives: November 2014

I swear, sometimes I think we’re just trying to outdo ourselves. There has been a whirlwind of activity lately – in the museum, in the conservation department, and in the Artifact Lab. Between “finding” a 6500 year-old skeleton in storage, to moving into our new conservation suite, it’s been so busy that I haven’t been very good about writing updates (but I promise to post some of the stuff about our new digs and equipment on the blog soon). Just when I thought things were settling down, this mysterious crate showed up at my door:

Okay, so at this point, it wasn’t a complete mystery – I knew what was in that crate (more or less) because last summer, some brave souls in the Egyptian Section managed to get this crate down from a very high shelf in storage. Once it was down, they found this note pinned to the top of the box:

Well, hello, Wilfred. As you can see, the team was very happy with themselves afterward, even if they had to get a little dirty in the process.

So who/what is Wilfred, exactly? Well, inside the crate we found this:

It’s an old, dirty mattress, with a wooden stick resting on top. And inside that mattress, we found…

A mummy! A badly damaged, but nonetheless very well-preserved mummy.The upper half of the body is where most of the damage is visible, exposing the human remains underneath, while the lower half appears pretty well-wrapped.

Today, my colleagues and I hoisted Wilfred out of the crate onto a temporary support. Here is what he looks like, sitting out on a table in the lab:

And there’s more. But I won’t write any more about him in this post, except to say that no, this isn’t the first time he’s been studied since coming to the museum in 1911 (he was x-rayed in the 1930s), but it is the first time that any of us here at the museum are really getting a good look at him.

As promised, Tawahibre’s coffin lid is now on display, front and center, in the Artifact Lab.

Tawahibre’s coffin lid on display at the entrance to the Artifact Lab

Getting this Late Period painted wooden coffin lid ready for display required months of treatment to clean the surface and to stabilize the flaking paint, powdery and crumbly gesso, and loose wood components. I blogged rather extensively about the treatment – follow this link to view some of my previous posts.

Here are some treatment images that were posted on the museum’s Facebook page last week, showing details of the head/upper body before, during, and after treatment:

Come visit Tawahibre in the lab, where you can examine the coffin lid up-close, read the conservation treatment report (which includes some materials identification reports), see more before, during, and after treatment images, and discuss the treatment with the conservator during open window times.

We have had a very special object in the Artifact Lab for a few weeks – this Predynastic ritual vessel in the shape of a woman:

E12281, after treatment

This vessel was excavated at Abydos, and we estimate that it is at least 5000 years old.
Here is a view of the vessel from the top:

I have worked almost exclusively on organic materials in the Artifact Lab, so getting to work on this ceramic was a nice diversion. Conservation treatment, which involved some light surface cleaning and minor mending, was requested because this object will be featured in an upcoming publication. It will leave the lab today, but I didn’t want it to leave without posting an image of it on the blog! Once the publication comes out, I’ll be sure to include a link to it.

In the meantime, to learn more, follow this link to check out a video discussion of a similar vessel, in the collection at the Brooklyn Museum: